Openings: Orta, Neapolitan-Style, Wood-Fired Pizza in Pembroke, Mass.

The crust is just thin enough—still bread not cracker, crisp but with chew. They're cooked in a wood-burning brick oven whose perfume you get a faint whiff of from the parking lot. On one occasion I wished my pie had stayed in the oven longer to get a bit more of a char, but I can't quibble with the bright flavor of the Margherita Napoletana's sauce, made from San Marzano tomatoes, or the array of vegetables on the Ortolana. Even topped with peppers, eggplant, and zucchini, the crust stayed crisp.

Though the owner, Jimmy Burke, studied in Naples and adheres to most of the standards of the Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana, the pizzas here are larger than standard-issue Neapolitan pizzas. Which is fine by me. [via MenuPages Boston]

Print:

Filed Under:

About the Author

Adam Kuban is the proprietor of the pop-up Margot's Pizza, which serves bar-style pizza. But you may also know him as the founder of Slice (RIP, 2003–2014) where he has written thousands of blog posts about pizza. He also created A Hamburger Today and served as Serious Eats's founding editor (2006–2010) after having sold those sites to SE.

Previewing your comment:

HTML Hints

Comment Guidelines

Post whatever you want, just keep it seriously about eats, seriously. We reserve the right to delete off-topic or inflammatory comments. Learn more in the Comment Policy section of our Terms of Use page.